Play is a newly expanding knowledge domain and the National Institute for Play sees itself as a student in this emerging field. We are maximizing our opportunities to learn – and to spread what we learn – by networking with a extensive and growing cadre of scientific experts and professional practitioners of Play. Together, they constitute the NIFP Council of Advisors, chaired by Stanford Professor and neuroscientist, Dr. Stuart Thompson.
- Bob Allen
- Gary Avischious
- Marc Bekoff, PhD
- Marian Diamond, PhD
- Fred Donaldson, PhD
- Scott Eberle, PhD
- Robert Fagen, PhD
- Bruce Fitch
- Frank Forencich
- Shervert Frazier, MD
- Alec Glover
- Jane Goodall, PhD
- Elizabeth Goodenough
- Roger Guillemin, MD PhD
- David Kennard
- Duncan Kennedy
- Jeff Lewine, PhD
- Alice Meckley, PhD
- Joe Meeker, PhD
- Jim O'Shaughnessy
- Jeff Peyton
- Marie Retherford RN, MFT
- CJ Rogers, PhD
- Robert Sapolsky, PhD
- Allan Schore, PhD
- Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, PhD
- Steve Siviy, PhD
- Victoria Stevens, PhD
- Howard Suber, PhD
- Stuart Thompson, PhD
- Mindy Upton
- John Ward
- Bowen White, MD
- Frank Wilson, MD
- Adrienne Zihlman, PhD
Organizations & Projects
CEO President and Chief Storytelling Officer of i.d.e.a.s.- a Creative Content Studio
Role & Area of Work
Innovation Consultant, creative artist, studio owner.
Organization & Projects
Founder, Coaching School
Role & Area of Work
Gifted volunteer coach who has developed a “love of the game-keep it playful” web based curriculum for new, largely unskilled parent-coaches. Has enlisted 4,000 participants in a successful pilot project in Colorado. Ready to take this program nationwide.
Organization & Projects
Professor Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Colorado
Role & Area of Work
Ethologist, play theoretician and expert on canine communication and play. Popular and scientific author. Broad contributions in linking “fairness” and handicapping in animal play, and the links between animal play behavior and human play.
Organization & Projects
Professor, Biology, UC Berkeley
Role & Area of Work
Pioneer in quantifying enriched (play-based) environments and their specific contributions to animal learning and social behavior. Brings in-depth knowledge of animal and human learning patterns, with enthusiasm for bringing science-based play into public policy.
Organization & Projects
Experience based theoretician, play practitioner author
Role & Area of Work
World-wide experience playing with gangs, special needs kids, wild animals. Founder of “Original” play.
Organization & Projects
Creative Director, VP Strong National Museum of Play
Role & Area of Work
Intellectual historian, Vice President for Historical Interpretation and Director of Play Studies, Strong – National Museum of Play, Author A Framework for Interpreting Play that provided the rationale (the Elements of Play – a departure in play theory) for changing the mission of the institution and creating the Strong – National Museum of Play®.
Organization & Projects
Former Professor University of Alaska, Fairbanks
Role & Area of Work
Bob Fagen’s background in ethology and mathematical biology spans almost a half century. The author of the classic scientific monograph “Animal Play Behavior”, he continues an active scientific career in retirement, writing and publishing technical papers and collecting comparative information on animal play.
Organization & Projects
Executive Director, Outward Bound Wilderness
Role & Area of Work
Expert in experiential learning, and play.
Organization & Projects
Play practitioner. Founder & Creative Director Exuberant Animal Play Foundation
Role & Area of Work
Has designed many games and activities based on innate human and primate design. Author of “Play as if Your Life Depends on It: Functional Exercise and Living for Homo Sapiens” and “Exuberant Animal: The Power of Health, Play and Joyful Movement” and a newsletter providing games and tips on things practical and playful.
Organization & Projects
Psychiatrist in Chief, emeritus, McLean Hospital, Harvard University
Role & Area of Work
Former director NIMH, expert in the causes and prevention of violence. Lifelong student of human learning and play behavior.
Organization & Projects
Former Chief Executive Officer of Hello Direct, Inc.
Role & Area of Work
Gifted in organizational management, Advisor, Board member of profit, non-profit Boards.
Organization & Projects
Founder, The Jane Goodall Institute
Role & Area of Work
Primatologist, Ethologist, Pioneering observer of Chimpanzee behavior and play. Discoverer of tool use by primates. A member of the NIFP board of directors. The world’s best known woman scientist. Received the UN humanitarian award of the year, 2003.
Organization & Projects
Teacher of English and American Literature at Harvard University, Claremont McKenna College and University of Michigan
Role & Area of Work
A scholar in children’s studies, she is the founding editor of the Landscapes of Childhood series at Wayne State University Press. She is developing a documentary film for public television, “Where Do the Children Play?”
Organization & Projects
Distinguished Professor, the Salk Institute, National Medal of Science, Nobel Laureate Medicine & Physiology, Neuroendocrinologist
Role & Area of Work
Dr. Guillemin earned the Nobel Prize in Medicine for work which brought to light an entire new class of substances, neurohormones, which regulate growth, reproduction and responses to stress. He founded the laboratory for neuroendocrinology at the Salk institute where he led the research which isolated endorphins, brain molecules known to act as natural opiates. He is also an accomplished musician and artist.
Organization & Projects
IncA (president)
Role & Area of Work
Producer-director of “Promise of Play” and many award-winning non-fiction films.
Organization & Projects
Creative VP Innovation, i.d.e.a.s.- a Creative Content Design School
Role & Area of Work
Experienced designer, improvisational comic, artist.
Organization & Projects
Associate Director The Hoglund Imaging Center. Professor, Neurology Kansas University
Role & Area of Work
Physicist, Researcher and expert in new imaging technologies. Will help craft research protocols and sites for studying the “state” of play.
Organization & Projects
Professor of Education, Millersville College
Role & Area of Work
Interest in the relationship of early play and its contributions to cognitive and emotional development. Director of Preschool Learning Center.
Organization & Projects
Professor, Union Institute. Ecologist, Ethologist, Classical Scholar
Role & Area of Work
Author, “The Comedy of Survival”. Expert on the history of the “loss”of adult play with the emergence of the Greco-Roman, Judeo-Christian, Industrial Revolution as mainstream traditions.
Organization & Projects
A seasoned executive and attorney, he is pioneering the field of corporate intellectual asset management strategies
Role & Area of Work
Jim has earned accolades as a thought and practice leader in the emerging field of intellectual and intangible asset management. A former partner in a national law firm and executive at Rockwell International, Jim is active on both corporate and civic boards of directors.
Organization & Projects
Classroom teacher, developer of Puppetools
Role & Area of Work
Has organized research protocols demonstrating the efficacy of individually motivated playful kid-puppet narrative as optimal learning technique.
Organization & Projects
Systems therapist
Role & Area of Work
Expert in the use of play and games for personal, institutional transformation.
Organization & Projects
Founder of “Raised by Wolves” Research Center
Role & Area of Work
Psychotherapist, animal behavior ethologist. Has made original contributions noting the importance of play in the establishment of communal social behavior in wolves and its relevance to the evolution of human cooperation.
Organization & Projects
Professor of Biological Sciences and Professor of Neurology and Neurological Sciences, Stanford University
Role & Area of Work
Popular and scientific author. A research neuroendocrinologist, as well as a field ethologist- primatologist studying the effects of stress on Baboon longevity and morbidity.
Organization & Projects
Clinical Professor, Psychiatry, UCLA
Role & Area of Work
Clinical Professor Psychiatry UCLA Pioneering psychologist and research psychoanalyst, Interdisciplinary expert on attachment behavior, and its links to affect regulation. Has validated hypotheses by brain imaging research. Believes the science of play is open for major research projects. Books by Allan Schore
Organization & Projects
Professor, of Philosophy, University Of Oregon
Role & Area of Work
An interdisciplinary independent scholar. Her most recent publications include studies of kinesthetic memory, human play, and the roots of morality. Expert in “knowing” through movement, play, dance.
Organization & Projects
Professor, Psychology, Gettysburg College
Role & Area of Work
Animal play experimental psychologist and evolution of play expert. Has quantified effects of play enhancing learning and synaptogenesis in rats.
Organization & Projects
Psychoanalyst, educator
Role & Area of Work
Expert in attachment behavior, transformative effects of analyst-patient attunement. Helped establish and taught at a play-based charter school for disadvantaged kids in LA, with remarkable results.
Organization & Projects
Distinguished Professor of film, emeritus, UCLA
Role & Area of Work
Educator, author, expert in human storytelling, narrative, Renowned for his analyses of what film stories and content change culture.
Organization & Projects
Professor of Biology, Neural Sciences and Humanities, Stanford University, research neuroscientist, Hopkins Marine Station
Role & Area of Work
Neurobiologist active in research on primal development and cellular communication in the nervous system. Sees play as a fundamental and organizing factor in complex brains.
Organization & Projects
Founder and Director of Blue Sky Preschool and kindergarten
Role & Area of Work
Has developed highly individualized play, music and storytelling curriculum with long term follow up on “graduates”. Blue Sky is open to continuing long term research examination of its students and graduates.
Organization & Projects
Artist, facilitator, organizational play consultant
Role & Area of Work
Gifted craftsman, hands-on play facilitator. Understands the importance of object play in brain development.
Organization & Projects
Board member, NIFP, corporate consultant
Role & Area of Work
Play practitioner, expert in stress medicine, play as therapy. Author of “Why Normal Isn’t Healthy”.
Organization & Projects
Neurologist, Professor Emeritus Stanford University
Role & Area of Work
Neurologist, expert on the co-evolution of the hand and the brain with emphasis on play as it relates to the origins of human language problem solving . Author of “The Hand”. In-depth interests in applying contemporary science to educational policy.
Organization & Projects
Professor, Anthropology, UCSC
Role & Area of Work
Expert in the origins of bipedalism, evolution of primate behavior. Widely published author.